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Stella Keating, 16, bravely delivered testimony to the senate alongside those who ve made their livelihoods out of demonising trans girls like her. (Human Rights Campaign)
Sixteen-year-old transgender girl Stella Keating spoke at the Senate Judiciary Committee, arguing in favour of the Equality Act – and she was the only trans person there.
Keating, a sophomore student from Tacoma, Washington, began her testimony by pointing out that she lives in a state where she is legally protected from discrimination.
“What happens if I want to attend college in a state that doesn’t protect me?” she said. “Right now, I could be denied medical care or be evicted for simply being transgender in many states. How is that even right? How is that even American?”
photo by: Screenshot, Justice Matters
Edith Guffey, Lawrence resident and conference minister for the United Church of Christ Kansas-Oklahoma Conference, gave the keynote address at Justice Matters virtual Martin Luther King Jr. event on Jan. 18.
Lawrence isn’t an island, Edith Guffey repeated during her keynote address at a Martin Luther King Jr. Day event on Monday.
There is this idea that the city is special, she said a “progressive blue dot” and that it is somehow different from other parts of the state in how it handles social justice issues. But that’s not the case, said Guffey, who is a Lawrence resident and a conference minister for the United Church of Christ Kansas-Oklahoma Conference.
Martin Luther King Jr. speaks in Atlanta in 1960. (AP Photo)
Local activist group Justice Matters will host a free virtual event on Martin Luther King Jr. Day aimed at bringing light to injustices in the community and how they can be combated.
Deacon Godsey, the co-president of Justice Matters, said the group hosted a series of listening sessions in the fall of 2020 where hundreds of community members gathered in Zoom meetings to talk about what issues and injustices they see in the Lawrence community. The Justice Matters event will discuss three of those injustices and provide evidence-based solutions.
The Zoom will cover the topics of homelessness, “racial disparities in discipline within Lawrence Public Schools” and “contributing to mass incarceration by misuse of the jail,” a press release stated. There will be three featured speakers during the event: Edith Guffey, conference minister for the United Church of Christ Kansas-Oklahoma Conference; Julia Orlando, direc